I was a little nervous about becoming a travel nurse so I decided to do a local assignment first. I had been located in Houston for 2 years. I thought it seemed like a good transition to travel nursing to be somewhere I know. This assignment was travel because I moved officially back home to Florida at the end of November.
Where:
My first assignment was at CHI St. Lukes in the Texas Medical Center. I had worked there 2 years ago before they did mass layoffs. I knew some of the staff and knew how they ran. I knew this would be my first assignment less scary. One of the first hospitals established in the Texas Medical Center. It is known as one of the best hospitals and for their Heart Institute. The first successful heart transplantation in the United States in 1968 and the first artificial heart implantation in the world in 1969 was performed at this hospital.
This ER sees sick patients. If you are wanting a slow ER, this assignment is not for you. I rarely saw an ESI 4 or 5. Almost every patient is an ESI 2 and sick. The patient population is LVADs, cardiac, strokes, and transplants. The ratio is 3:1, but can be moved to 4:1 depending on what is going on on the floor. If you have a sick patient that requires a 1:1; example: code, TPA, just tubed a patient; they will move the assignment around till that patient is stable. I think this is amazing not all ERs do this.
Travel Friendly: 5/5
There were 5 travelers that started when I did. This hospital seems to be run by travelers. There would be nights where there were all be travelers minus the charge and triage. I had worked at this hospital a few years ago so some people still remembered me. I had lived in Houston before and had a friend group there. I also started 4 other travelers started with me in the ER. These factors made it easier to make friends. The staff never made me feel like an outsider. I was always invited to Morning Debriefing (drinks) and keep in the loop about things happening on the unit. One example of how great the staff was when I was alone on Christmas. I was sad and lonely so the charge nurse invited me for Christmas potluck.
ER: 4/5
I only give it a 4 because I liked it but the 4 other travelers that started with me hated it. But I also think that they had a false idea of what they were getting into. As a traveler, you are there because they need you. The hospital is not going to be perfect. The way they do thing maybe weird and maybe that’s why they can’t get FT staff. I enjoyed the ER because there was a mix of sick patients. Some travel assignments don’t let travelers take their specialty patients. St. Luke’s ER gave out the assignments equally and fairly. I enjoyed learning about and taking care of a different patient population I had not taken care of before.
Hospital: 2/5
This hospital maybe magnet, but it does not feel that way. It did not seem to care about its nurses. A week before I started my assignment a mislabeled type and screen lead to a patients death. I want to make it clear that I thought the nurses I worked with were amazing, but I felt the way the people at the top were running St. Luke’s made the hospital bad. I remember when St. Luke’s was known as the best hospital in Houston. After the layoffs and the blood transfusion death, no one in the city wants to work there. CMS had come while I was on assignment to investigate t the death. This lead to a huge shakeup in upper management and so many in-services it wasn’t even funny. It felt like every week I was come up to and told how to chart something different with blood.
Click here if you would like to read about the blood error and what CMS found.
Overall: 3.5/5
I personally would take an assignment there again. The staff was the saving grace of this assignment. I know that you can get top dollar working there since all the problems they are having are public. They tried to get me to stay for $1800 a week, but I felt it was time to move on. I love Houston. It gave me the big city environment I wanted and there is always something to do.
Agency: American Mobile
American Mobile is one of the biggest travel nurse companies in the US. They have a lot of sister companies that are under their umbrella. I had read so many bad things about them online and on the travel nurse chat rooms. I decided to give them a chance. I thought that not everything they said could be true. They also had the contract in Houston I wanted. You will found that a lot of the time American Mobile will have exclusive contracts with hospitals, called the first tier. If their company cannot fill the needs, then it will go down the tiers to other travel companies.
Thoughts?
I think it had a lot to do with my recruiter but I had a bad experience. The thing people were saying online was that they were not getting paid on time. I got paid but was being paid lower than everyone else. My recruiter never returned my calls or emails until I was offered an extension. When I confronted my recruiter she seemed to not care. This is when I decided that I was looking for a new company. I know AMN has a lot of big city contracts, so I know I will work with them again. But next time I’ll look for a reference before picking a recruiter.
nursewhotravels 